Play Mackerelmedia Fish, a strangely adorable ode to dying websites

Nathalie Lawhead

Have you installed the latest version of Mackerelmedia Fish? No, not Macromedia Flash. Mackerelmedia Fish. The piscine rich media plugin, created by experimental game designer Nathalie Lawhead, used in projects like the hacking tool Haxatron 2000. A relic of an era where social media hadn’t eaten the internet, amateurish weirdness was the norm, and visiting a website might involve clicking through an endless series of arcane installation screens. The website is still online, but if you click the wrong link, you may be eaten by a grue.

Lawhead, known for projects likeTetrageddon Games and Everything Is Going To Be OK, explains a little more about Mackerelmedia Fishon her blog. It’s a short and surreal game about digital archaeology,…